I stand on my head on Desolation Peak
And see that the world is hanging
Into an ocean of endless space
The mountains dripping rock by rock
Like bubbles in the void
And tending where they want—
That at night the shooting stars
Are swimming up to meet us
Yearning from the bottom black
But never make it, alas—
That we walk around clung
To earth
Like beetles with big brains
Ignorant of where we are, how,
What, & upsidedown like fools,
Talking of governments & history,
—But Mount Hozomeen
The most beautiful mountain I ever seen,
Does nothing but sit & be a mountain,
A mess of double pointed rock
Hanging pouring into space
O frightful silent endless space
—Everything goes to the head
Of the hanging bubble, with men
The juice is in the head—
So mountain peaks are points
Of rocky liquid yearning

~ ~ ~

Whenever I get lost, thinking too much about the world and how hard it can be sometimes, I remember that there is the lonely fire lookout on Desolation Peak.

Two bricklayers are setting the wallsof a cellar in a new dug out patchof dirt behind an old house of woodwith brown gables grown over with ivyon a shady street in Denver. It is noonand one of them wanders off. The youngsubordinate bricklayer sits idly fora few minutes after eating a sandwichand throwing away the paper bag. Hehas on dungarees and is bare abovethe waist; he has yellow hair and wearsa smudged but still bright red capon his head. He sits idly on topof the wall on a ladder that is leanedup between his spread thighs, his headbent down, gazing uninterestedly atthe paper bag on the grass. He drawshis hand across his breast, and thenslowly rubs his knuckles across theside of his chin, and rocks to and froon the wall. A small cat walks to himalong the top of the wall. He picksit up, takes off his cap, and puts itover the kitten’s body for a moment.Meanwhile it is darkening as if to rainand the wind on top of the trees in thestreet comes through almost harshly.

Denver, Summer 1947

~ ~ ~

Now, the last Ginsberg post is not to say that his early stuff is not great. It is of course great, monumental and beautiful. It goes without saying. Just look at this. This scene he creates, and the way he dissolves it at the end with almost equal beauty.

Reading Sung poems, I think of my poems to Nealdead a few years now, Jack undergroundinvisible – their faces rise in my mind.Did I write truthfully of them? In later timesI saw them little, not much difference they’re dead.The live in books and memory, strong as on earth.

“I do not know who is hoarding all this rare work.”

Old One the dog stretches stiff legged,soon he’ll be underground. Spring’s first fat beebuzzes yellow over the new grass and dead leaves.

What’s this little brown insect walking zigzagacross the sunny white page of Su Tung-p’o’s poem?Fly away, tiny mite, even your life is tender –I lift the book and blow you into the dazzling void.

“You live apart on rivers and seas…”

You live in apartments by rivers and seasSpring comes, waters flow murky the salt wave’s covered with oily dungSun rises, smokestacks cover the roofs with black mistwinds blow, city skies are clear blue all afternoonbut at night the full moon hesitates behind brick.How will all these millions of people worship the Great Mother?When all these millions of people die, will they recognize the Great Father?

Cherry Valley, April 20, 1973

~ ~ ~

This is absolutely one of my favorite Ginsberg poems. People tend to focus on his work of the 40s and 50s as his most vital, and it’s easy to forget that when Jack and Neal died – when many people thought beat itself was dead – men like Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti (and so many more) carried on with the Zen beat message and poetry for generations. Ginsberg is gone now too, a tiny mite blown into the void, but even today Snyder and Ferlinghetti and others are as vital today as they ever were, perhaps more so. It would be a sad mistake for poetry and beat fans to focus only on the Six Gallery days and forget the beautiful lifetimes that followed.

A sweet disorder in the dress Kindles in clothes a wantonness; A lawn about the shoulders thrown Into a fine distraction; An erring lace, which here and there Enthrals the crimson stomacher; A cuff neglectful, and thereby Ribands to flow confusedly; A winning wave, deserving note, In the tempestuous petticoat; A careless shoe-string, in whose tie I see a wild civility: Do more bewitch me, than when art Is too precise in every part.

~ ~ ~

This one’s from 1648. Yeah, look at the cool guy with his 362-year-old poetry. Seriously though, I really like this little poem and I’ll tell you why. To me this poem perfectly describes poetry itself. Poetry is an ancient thing, originally born from earth and pure emotion, out of the wild. It is humanity’s oldest way to explore and think about the natural world, our place in it, and the mysterious forces that we feel govern it. But poetry is also an art of kings and scholars; and this duality is shown here. “Sweet disorder,” “fine distraction,” and of course – so beautifully said – “wild civility.” Wild civility. If that is not poetry’s true identity I don’t know what is.

And Herrick was right to choose the word “bewitch” when he describes what this wild civility does to him, because poetry, as I said before, is about the mysterious forces – about magic. And I don’t mean magic in the cheesy, is this your card way – I mean magic in the old school way. It’s hard to say what I mean…like Tom Robbins said, “using words to describe magic is like using a screwdriver to cut roast beef.” But I think you understand just the same. Poetry is essentially a catalog of the world’s mysteries.

Too many birds in one treeToo many birds in one treeAnd the sky is full of black and screaming leavesThe sky is full of black and screaming

And one more birdThen one more birdAnd one last birdAnd another

One last black bird without a place to landOne last black bird without a place to beTurns around in hopes to find the place it last knew restOh black bird, over black rain burnThis is not where you last knew restYou fly all night to sleep on stoneThe heartless rest that in the morn, we’ll be goneYou fly all night to sleep on stone, to return to the tree with too many birdsToo many birdsToo many birds

IfIf youIf you couldIf you could onlyIf you could only stopIf you could only stop yourIf you could only stop your heartIf you could only stop your heart beatIf you could only stop your heart beat forIf you could only stop your heart beat for oneIf you could only stop your heart beat for one heartIf you could only stop your heart beat for one heart beat

~ ~ ~

This song is very beautiful on the page, especially that last section, where each line has this new nuance that carries you along. But – the song must really be heard to be loved.

The wallmap with its spray of shipping lanesDescribing arcs across the blue North Channel…And in the middle of the road to school,Ox-eye daisies and wild dandelions.

Learning’s easy carried! The bag is light,Scuffed and supple and unemptiableAs an itinerant school conjuror’s hat.So take it, for a word-hoard and a handsel,

As you step out trig and look back all at onceLike a child on his first morning leaving parents.

~ ~ ~

I really have a thing for Heaney’s poetry these days. As a reader he is constantly rewarding; I could flip to any page in any of his books and be perfectly satisfied, and more likely blown away, by the poem I found there. He’s a magician, an alchemist. I look at his poems and think, these are just words. These are simple words I know and use. And yet he shapes them into magic, over and over again. This is true poetry here friends, I hope you’re seeing it.